Kiwi Flowers

Day 269: I have yet to get a kiwi off my hardy, self-fertile vine, but the first few time it bloomed, it did so before the pollinators had arrived. Last year, it appeared to have set fruit, but then we were hit with a protracted spell of triple-digit temperatures and every berry in my garden dropped. That included not only the young, developing kiwis, but the mature gooseberries and red currants as well. I salvaged the jam fruits, carefully picking each one out of the bark mulch, but the kiwis were a total loss. Not a single berry remained. The vine seems to have learned a lesson as it's settled in, and is behaving accordingly by flowering slightly later when the pollinators are active. If our cooler, more normal weather holds, I might just see some fruit this year. In other news, though, the eight or nine figs I thought might provide a late-summer snack have disappeared. Because they have gone missing overnight and there is no evidence of them on the ground beneath the tree, I suspect a raccoon has been active.